Site Mobile Navigation

Posts tagged with PHOTOVOLTAIC

Jack Smith/The New York TimesWhen Bill and Suzann Leininger put solar panels on their Escondido, Calif., home a few years ago, they most likely enhanced its resale value, a new study says.

All those homeowners who have been installing residential solar panels over the last decade may find it was a more practical decision than they thought. The electricity generated may have cost more than that coming from the local power company (half of which, nationwide, comes from burning coal), but if they choose to sell their homes, the price premium they will get for the solar system should let them recoup much of their original capital investment.

That is the conclusion of three researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, who looked at home sales — both homes with photovoltaic systems and homes without — in California over an eight-and-a-half-year period ending in mid-2009. The abstract of their study states, “the analysis finds strong evidence that California homes with PV systems have sold for a premium over comparable homes without PV systems.”

The premium ranged from $3.90 to $6.40 per watt of capacity, but tended most often to be about $5.50 per watt. This, the study said, “corresponds to a home sales price premium of approximately $17,000 for a relatively new 3,100-watt PV system (the average size of PV systems in the study).” Read more…

The installation, scaled down slightly from the original plan, will cost $515 million, and will add $1.20 to $4 a year to the average residential customer’s electricity bill, a spokesman, Paul L. Rosengren, said. He did not say what the electricity would cost per kilowatt-hour but acknowledged, “solar is above-market.” The large scale of the project is intended to hold down costs, he said.

The installation is a little less than one-twentieth of the amount of solar power that New Jersey is required to have in place by 2020.Read more…

(Credit: Building Technologies, Inc.)Solar photovoltaic panels like this one above could supply 12 percent of the power needs in the European Union by 2020.

The solar photovoltaic industry has an image problem: The costs of installing solar panels remain high relative to wind power and fossil fuels, and the solar industry is concerned that too many potential users believe that the costs are stuck at those high levels.

But by next year electricity from solar photovoltaic panels will be cost-competitive with power from the grid in parts of southern Europe, a development that would highlight a move toward much greater affordability, said Winfried Hoffmann, the president of the European Photovoltaic Industry Association.

“Many politicians still have the perception that photovoltaic is only good for satellites” and a few other niche applications, said Mr. Hoffmann, who is also the chief technology officer for energy and environmental solutions for Applied Materials in Germany. Instead the industry was demonstrating a track record in lowering prices in the same way that manufacturers of computer processors and flat-screen televisions had made their products affordable for many more households, he said.

“A flat-panel television is just a very sophisticated solar module,” he said on Monday.

Mr. Hoffmann was in Brussels to present the results of a study conducted in collaboration with A.T. Kearney, a consultancy, showing that photovoltaic power could supply as much as 12 percent of electricity demand in the European Union by 2020, up from less than 1 percent now.Read more…

But Rhone Resch, the president of the solar group, warned that the financial crisis has hit the industry hard, since financing for projects has largely dried up.

“We’re not immune to the recession at all,” he said at a briefing for journalists this morning in Washington. “This first quarter has been brutal.”

Of the four types of solar power surveyed, photovoltaic capacity grew especially quickly, at 44 percent over total installed capacity through 2007. Solar hot water installations also showed strong growth.

Solar pool heating, already the largest solar sector, added slightly less capacity last year than in 2007, and no new concentrating solar power projects – large, utility-scale projects that use mirrors to harness the sun’s energy – came online last year.

The report is expected to be available late Thursday on the Solar Energy Industries Association’s Web site.

Demand for clean-energy products may be slumping because of the global economic slowdown, but the European Commission says it is doing what it can to keep interest in the sector alive.

As part of that effort the Commission is holding a Sustainable Energy Week in Brussels this week. There have been a wide range of events and displays promoting clean-energy projects, businesses and collaborations.

Among the week’s highlights:

Covenant of MayorsMore than 350 cities pledged to go beyond European Union targets for cutting carbon dioxide emissions 20 percent by 2020. Most of the energy produced in Europe is consumed in urban areas and the “battle against climate change will have to be fought and won in the cities,” said Andris Piebalgs, the E.U. Energy Commissioner.

The signing of the Covenant sent “a strong message of hope, particularly in the difficult times that we are facing,” said Mr. Piebalgs. More than 100 mayors across Europe participated in the launch ceremony.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York offered his support for the initiative in a video message, but did not commit the city to any targets.

About

How are climate change, scarcer resources, population growth and other challenges reshaping society? From science to business to politics to living, our reporters track the high-stakes pursuit of a greener globe in a dialogue with experts and readers.